Angeli della Morte
by Ailytha Akemeti
Summary: Dangerously over-manipulated experiments that were never expected to live became crown jewels of Itex after Maximum Ride's escape. They were highly trained to do the company's dark deeds. Too highly trained. What happens when Angels of Death escape Hell?
1. AN

Hello peoples.

This is set as if Itex never fell, and Fang didn't leave the flock. Basically as if the books from FANG onwards never happened. That's all. Enjoy.

PS: Oh, Total is holidaying with Akila in Italy.

PPS: Ella got into a really good boarding school. She'll probably be there for most of the story.

PPPS: I only did the above so that I wouldn't have too many characters to write. Sorry.

PPPPS: If I were James Patterson, I would have never wrote Angel. So there. Disclaimed.

PPPPPS: Sorry about all the postscripts.


	2. This can't be good

A crow took off into the air.

The girl's head whipped around to look for what had startled it. A man in hunting gear was in the bushes, just off the path.

He obviously thought he was being sneakier than he actually was; by the way he eyed the deer resting just under the tree that the dark-haired girl perched in.

_Dammit. Knew that a national forest was a bad idea. But I thought you couldn't even hunt in those._

She brushed her fingers against the shoe of the boy next to her. He turned, and followed her eyes to the hunter. He let out a silent breath. Well, silent to all but her.

_He's annoyed._

She smirked in satisfaction. She had told the white-haired boy that such a public place was a bad idea. But he had insisted it would be one of the last places they would run into Itex field agents.

The boy angled himself so that his silver hair was hidden from the hunter's sight range. In a sign language that they had created themselves, he spoke to the black-haired girl. **We've got to go.**

She rolled her eyes. **Oh really? You don't think we should stay here and be discovered?**

He gave her a look. **Sarcasm not appreciated right now.**

_Says the prince of annoyingly witty remarks._

Without a rustle, the duo leapt to a tree that took them away from the hunter, and continued to travel like that until they found an especially tall pine and scaled it, mustering a great deal of skill to avoid being seen.

"Ok. So where do we go from here?" The boy shifted his shoulders a little, as a pair of enormous cloud grey wings unfurled from his back. Folding them back against himself, he looked intently at the girl's grass green eyes.

"I don't know. Probably need to get some new clothes soon. These Itex outfits aren't exactly conspicuous, and I don't think living in a gaming forest is a good idea." The girl's wings were a much darker shade of grey, almost black. They were flecked with white, not unlike the way the boy's wings were flecked with black.

"Nearest small town with a mall it is, then." He sighed, and leapt off the tree into thin air.

Freefalling for a second or two for maximum lift, the boy snapped his wings open and turned to look at the girl with blue eyes. She wasn't far behind, beating her ash coloured wings at an angle to keep her body upright.

"Judging by the angle of the sun, it's almost twilight. We should wait until it gets dark to go to a town, cause, you know." She picked at the standard-issue Itex uniform t-shirt.

"So where do we go for now?"

"Well, the thing is, I think it'll take us the time we have until nightfall to even find the nearest town." She gestured to the seemingly endless expanse of greenery below them.

He frowned for a moment, then smirked. "So, fifteen minutes?"

* * *

><p>"Max!"<p>

"Ma-ax."

"Max! Wake up!"

Groggily, the bird-teen sat up and faced whoever had interrupted her sleep. Nudge looked back at her. She talked excitedly. "Max, Angel wants to talk to you! She says it's important, and she really needed to tell you first. Oh my gosh, maybe she has a new power or something. Anyway, it's really super important and you need to go talk to her NOW!"

Nudge was practically dragging Max to Angel's part of the room. There was a part where the wall dipped in behind the bathroom. Angel had curtained it off and had made a little private corner.

After the whole Dylan fiasco, Iggy had insisted he join the flock. After all that had happened, he was still a birdkid, and the blind boy knew what it was like to be outcasted. Dylan had become a lot more closed up after his botched suicide attempt, but he was warming up. The flock had settled at Dr. M's house, much to her delight and dismay. Delight because she loved them, and wanted to take care of them, a little dismayed at the skyrocketed food bills. All was working out however, and they had all found ways to pitch in.

Iggy had found a job at a local mechanics for example, and Dylan and Fang were working some hours at an adventure course. It all seemed so... mundane after all they had been through. But it was temporary.

Itex was still on the rage. Soon they would have to be dealt with.

Max stumbled into Angel's 'room'. Angel was sitting on her bed, and patted a spot next to her. Max sat next to the eight-year-old. She looked at what she would once have thought of as an angelic face.

Even now, when that certain chapter of their lives seemed to be over, she would never forget what Angel said and did. She had learnt to respect, and sometimes, even fear the little girl.

"Max, I think we need to get back out there." Max knew exactly what she was talking about. They couldn't dawdle much longer with Itex.

"I know, Angel."

"No you don't. I found something strange this last night. Just over in Collbran." Max's eyes widened. The small town wasn't even a ten minute flight from Dr M's house.

"What? What did you find? Was it something from Itex, or-" Angel cut her off.

"Max, it wasn't a some_thing_. It was a some_one_."

"A whitecoat?" Angel shook her head.

"Worse. An experiment. Two, actually." Max knotted her eyebrows.

"How did you know they're experiments?" It was at this point, when Angel actually looked troubled, that Max realised how bad it was.

"The thing is- the thing is Max, I-" The little girl stuttered for a moment before composing herself with an irritated sigh. "I couldn't read their minds."

Fang appeared from the wall. "Oh, this is bad."

* * *

><p>If one passed by the boy and girl sitting on the bench, they wouldn't seem strange.<p>

They looked around fifteen. They were both in windbreaker jackets, zipped up. The girl wore loose black pants, with multiple pockets all over them. The boy had a beanie shoved over his head, wore thin grey jeans, and had a backpack slung over his shoulders.

Shadow and Silver were in fact thirteen, nearing fourteen. The windbreakers were to hide their wings more comfortably than simple hoodies, which would have been stuffy and tight.

They in fact had hoodies on underneath the windbreakers. The two got cold easily.

Zipped pockets. All the pockets and the backpack were for convenience in flight. That and they liked their hands free, so no carrying things. Oh and the beanie? To cover Silver's obnoxiously attention-catching hair. They had also taken the liberty to clean themselves up a little, sneaking into someone's house earlier. The public facilities were too risky.

Shadow took Silver's hand, and leaned into him, tapping his hand with a finger. To any passerby, they would look like a teenage couple, the girl absentmindedly tapping on the boy's hand. In actuality, she was communicating through Morse code. The whole leaning into him and smiling was just to mask the contact and distract more... trained people, if there were any around, from what she was doing.

**do you think we are watched**

He stroked her hair and left his hand on her back, tapping his fingers in what could be assumed to be a rhythm.

**we are always watched but never seen**

Shadow smiled up at him. "Want to get something to eat, sweetie?"

He laughed. "Sure, hon."

* * *

><p>"What do you mean, you have to leave?" Dr Martinez looked worried. Sure, they took up room and used up food and water, and a lot of other things, but that didn't mean she didn't enjoy the Flock living with her. She looked at Max. "Is there something wrong?" She sat down at the kitchen island as Max began to speak.<p>

"We don't know if it's _wrong_ exactly yet. It's just...unusual." Max evaded the word _alarming_. She glanced at Fang.

"What Max is trying to say is, that it's something we need to check out. It could be a problem, it could not be, and we just need to find out." Max was half relieved at his help and half jealous of his way of making everything sound so _casual_.

"So do you need to leave right away, or what?" Dr M sat back in the chair and looked at Max with the kind of expression you'd see on a mother watching her child grow up. Obviously, Max was passed the point of 'growing up', but the emotion behind it was the same: fear for her daughter.

"We'll gather the flock and leave in a couple of hours." Max looked at Dr Martinez. "Don't worry mom, it's probably just nothing. But we can't do what we do living here. It'd just put you in danger. I can't risk that. Not again."

Her mother nodded and gave her daughter a hug that, couple of years before, Max wouldn't have returned. "I promise that if it's nothing we'll come straight back. It's not too far."

"Okay. Come on Fang, let's round up the gang."

* * *

><p>It was a windy day. The Flock were all kitted out in backpacks stuffed with windbreakers and changes of clothes, courtesy of Dr Martinez. Their formation had had to be adjusted to fit in Dylan. Max, Fang and Iggy still took the centre front, partly because Fang had absolutely insisted that Iggy retain his place, and partly because Iggy was a stronger flier than Dylan. Behind Fang and Iggy were Gazzy and Angel, then Nudge and Dylan brought up the rear.<p>

"How long, Angel?" Max was scanning the ground for the telltale signs of a suburb.

"About three more minutes."

The few minutes passed by in a blur of green ground and grey sky. The flock landed behind a restaurant. Angel immediately began searching for the closed-up minds she had found the day before.

"How do you look for something if you can't sense it?" Gazzy pondered aloud.

"It's like you look for a gap." Angel paused for a moment. "No, that's not right. It's like looking for empty bottles in the middle of heaps of full ones" she replied.

"That sounds hard." Angel didn't reply.

"I've found them. They're inside!" The flock threw on their windbreakers and started for the front of the tiny building. "Oh my gosh, this is so exciting! I bet they're really cool and have like, super powers and stuff."Fang looked at Nudge for a moment. "Oh that's right, we have superpowers too! Oh, they probably have something really neat like- like firebending!"

Iggy rolled his eyes. "Just stop talking Nudge." He promptly crashed into a drainpipe, concentration fixed on finding which direction Nudge was in. "Ow. Those have sharp bits."

The birdkids went into the small burger-and-fries place discreetly. Or as discreetly as seven creepily tall teens and preteens could in a small-town restaurant.

"Over there. By the window." Angel tried not to look at them directly. Max and Fang went to order some food, just as a cover, while the flock pushed a couple of tables together and sat down. They had instinctively stayed near the door.

As the leaders of the flock returned with their food, the flock snuck occasional glances at the couple of kids sat next to the only window. They looked pretty average, if it weren't for the windbreakers. _**Birdkids!**_

They looked about fifteen-sixteen, or about fourteen in bird kid standards. One was a boy and the other was a girl. The boy had a beanie covering the top of his head. The girl had dark hair.

"Okay kids, lunch time!" Fang put on a kind grin. It didn't suit him. Max had told the cashier that they were a church group. So Fang went along with it. He got some weird looks from Iggy and Dylan, while the younger kids barely seemed to notice as they dug into the fries.

Shadow looked over at the cheerful exclamation. Her eyes widened a fraction. Her toe met Silver's, and turned his foot in the direction of the people. If one hadn't known him, they'd say he just glanced and didn't give a toss. But he took out a napkin and started tapping it, using his arm to shield it from other people.

* * *

><p><strong>the cali flock the blind one has good hearing<strong>

Shadow smiled at him, and leaned over as if to whisper something to him. She touched his arm.

**maximum ride and dylan this cant be good**

Over at the Flock's table, Nudge asked Iggy what they were whispering about. He furrowed his eyebrows. "That's strange. They aren't saying anything."

Shadow had just as good hearing as the strawberry blonde boy. _Oh crap. Forgot the distraction!_

"...so I was telling Amanda that you liked her, and she totally bought it..."

Silver was confused for a second, but went with it. "Oh you're so cruel! She'll latch onto me like a leech now!..."

* * *

><p>Iggy relayed this to the Flock, through Angel. Max wasn't convinced.<p>

_**They could just be really good at hiding.**_

Fang agreed.

_**Angel, tell everyone to stay here while me and Max go check them out.**_

Within the minute, Max and Fang were striding over to the kids in jackets not unlike their own.

"Hello, we're from Mesa Lutheran Church, and we haven't seen you around before. We'd like to introduce ourselves. I'm Nicholas and this is Maxine." Fang put on his creepy smile again.

* * *

><p><em>Nicholas? Maxine? Church? They couldn't have come up with something more convincing?<em>

"Hello Nicholas, Maxine. I'm Natalya and this is my brother Derek." Shadow was a perfect liar. Silver had been trained to act from a young age. "We're just back from visiting our grandma in Moscow, up in Russia and took the east way back. Thought we might as well explore some of America while we're on the move." His New York accent was flawless.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Wow. They <strong>_**are**_** good.**_

"Oh, that sounds wonderful. Gosh, it's so hot in here. I can't stand wearing my jacket." Max had tucked in her wings especially tight into her polo. She slung it over her shoulder. Fang followed suit. "You should take yours off too, it gets pretty hot around here."

"Oh good idea. It _is_ getting a little stuffy." Shadow shrugged off her jacket, and positioned her torso in a way that the slight abnormality in the curve of her back was hidden completely.

Silver was eating his potatoes. He grinned up at Max and Fang. "I get cold easily." He pointed at the beanie.

"Oh he does. He wears sweaters in June. And to think there's Russian blood in him!" Each aspect of her humorous expression was well practiced.

* * *

><p><em><strong>This is gonna take a while.<strong>_

* * *

><p>Shadow put on her confused expression, and pointed at Max's back. "What's that?" She drew a feather from the slit in Max's top at an unnatural speed. Max narrowed her eyes. "Oh, this is a big feather! It's the size of a peacock's feather, and just as pretty!" She put on a face of wonderment.<p>

_Sigh. Time to end this charade._

"But it's nowhere near as pretty as THIS one." Silver held back a yelp as Shadow plucked a feather from under his jacket. She compared Silver's speckled grey feather to Max's mottled brown feather.

Max's face was one of surprise and slight mortification, while Fang studied the feathers carefully.

"I reckon my Maximum's is prettier." Fang said finally.

Shadow pouted. "You obviously have no taste." She shoved the feathers in her and Silver's backpack before anyone could see them.

Max on the other hand, had elbowed Fang. "You used my name!"

"Oh please. They obviously know who we are."

"And how to tick me off."

Fang snorted quietly. "Everyone ticks you off."

Max ignored his comment. "You. Us. Outside. Five minutes."

She stalked back to the Flock, who had inhaled half the food in the few minutes Max and Fang were gone.

Silver looked at Shadow. She raised her eyebrow.

"You heard Subject Seven's Maximum. Hurry up and finish your potatoes."

Over at the flock's table, Iggy relayed in speech. Max whacked Fang upside the head.

Shadow and Silver walked out of the fast food restaurant, Shadow snuggling into Silver's neck. They had to remember they were playing their 'teen couple' cover. Silver whispered in Shadow's hair and she giggled accordingly. They sat on the pavement in front of the building as the flock streamed out in twos and threes. As Max beckoned towards behind the building with a jerk of her head, Silver took Shadow's hand and they walked around the corner of the street.

* * *

><p><em><strong>They better be coming. Or I'm gonna kick their asses.<strong>_

Max tapped her foot impatiently against the grass. Then someone tapped her shoulder.

There was a yell as Shadow tried to get Max's attention. "Shush! You'll get the chef on us!" Shadow looked towards the back door of the restaurant.

Max narrowed her eyes and studied the two new bird kids carefully.

Silver looked bored. "How about we take this a little further from civilisation? There's a forest just over seven minute's flight north."

Max tried not to roll her eyes. Of course they knew there was a forest nearby. They lived in it! Fang spoke up. "How do we know you won't bolt for it?" They wouldn't be able to anyway, it was seven to two, but he wasn't taking any chances.

Shadow smirked and Silver chuckled. "You don't. And I don't think you would have any chance if we chose too, anyway." Shadow felt lazy that day, and didn't bother to take the threatening undertone out of the sentence.

A red alert was going off in Max's head. _**They're dangerous. **_"Iggy, take the kids and go back to Mom's. Fang and Dylan, with me." Angel protested.

"You have to take me! You won't know if their lying!"

"You can't even read their minds, Angel. We'll have to do this the old fashioned way."

Shadow raised an eyebrow. "That's what this is about? You're after us cause Subject Eleven can't read our minds?"

Max was getting more and more suspicious at the second. "How do you know so much about us? Who are you?" As Max got more and more agitated, Silver opened his mind just a crack, and sent a thought to Angel.

_Angel. We won't hurt you or your flock. We won't run away from you. We will only allow you access to parts of our minds. But that's the best offer we can give you. Please. Realise we are like you. _

Angel froze. "Max."

"Not now Angel, I-"

"Max, they've agreed to come with us. The boy let me hear him."

"_Let_ you? They can control that?"

Shadow butted in. "We're, ah, taught. How to block skills like Subject Eleven's from entering our minds."

Max looked at her. Then she looked back at Angel. "The boy really just wants to move so we're away from people." Angel said.

Max moved her gaze from Angel, to Fang, and then to Silver and Shadow. "Alright. Scrap the original plan. Everyone stays. On their toes, that is. We're going to the Mesa National Forest." If they were really as docile as Angel claimed, then it was probably safe. But Maximum Ride didn't take chances.

Max moved her gaze from Angel, to Fang, and then to Silver and Shadow. "Alright. Scrap the original plan. Everyone stays. On their toes, that is. We're going to the Mesa National Forest." If they were really as docile as Angel claimed, then it was probably safe. But Maximum Ride didn't take chances.


	3. So if there's an ambush

Shadow took the chance of the noisy wind to talk to Silver about what they were doing.

"How much do we let them know?"

"Everything."

Shadow looked at Silver as if he had grown an extra head. "What? Are you insane? How do we know that they won't leave us out to dry with the media?"

Silver looked at his partner's confused face. "They're like us, Shad. We will benefit from this."

"But if they know what we are, then-"

"We're letting them read our minds. They'll get the whole story, don't you worry."

"Fine. All of our story, but fuzz over the specifics with our training. We don't want them knowing _everything_ we can do."

Silver nodded.

As they landed, Shadow and Silver sat in a part-triangle, inviting Angel to complete it.

After a couple of minutes of 'trying' to open their own minds, in which time they were actually making sure Angel would be blocked from specific ability memories and especially _supernatural_ parts of their brains, Shadow and Silver's thoughts were flowing freely for Angel to investigate.

Max looked over worriedly to Angel, who had her eyebrows furrowed and would occasionally gasp, presumably in shock. Then Angel went stock still, and Max would have intervened if it weren't for Fang holding her back.

After a few more minutes, Angel opened her eyes. "Oh wow..."

Max rushed to the eight-year-old's side. "What is it?"

"Max, they're not bad people. They're names are Shadow and Silver. They're only thirteen. They were _used_ by Itex. They were trained for ten years in Russia before being Itex's pet assassins-"

"_Assassins_?" Max sped between Shadow and Silver and the younger flock members. "I _knew_ we couldn't trust them!" There was a hint of smugness in Max's voice.

"That's why we were taught to shield our minds. Couldn't exactly have people controlling us in the middle of a job now, could we?" Shadow said, exasperated.

"That, and because this is exactly how people react when they realise the truth. It gets monotonous after a while." Silver looked disinterested.

Angel was embarrassed and annoyed at Max. "Let me finish! They only cooperated because they were and would have been _terminated _if they didn't!"

"But if they're so _well trained_, then how could they threaten them with that anyhow?" Max's tone was almost mocking.

"Extermination chips implanted into our brains. One press of a button and Silver and I would have had skulls full of melted, cooked through neurons." Shadow said, irritated now more than ever.

Dylan said something at last. "Wait. Past tense."

Silver took over, while Shadow went to punch a tree. She wasn't usually that hot-headed, but Max was getting to her with her high-and-mighty attitude. "Yes. Past tense. They trained us too well. On our last mission, we slipped into a hospital and removed the chips from each other. Itex never noticed. After that, we just blew right through their 'titanium-reinforced concrete' walls and high-tailed it outta there."

Silver lifted off his beanie and brushed away some of his snow-white hair to reveal a small scar.

Fang looked at Max with a 'Not-with-a-shell-see' look. She blatantly ignored it.

Angel took over the conversation again. "And that's not all. They have something that we don't. We're dual-species hybrids. They're triple-species."

For about the hundredth time that day, Max looked alarmed and suspicious.

"Shadow's only ninety-seven percent human. Two percent's avian, obviously, and the leftover one percent's feline. She has really good hearing, and night vision and stuff." Shadow nodded. She was a lot calmer. There was a tree that had a fist-sized dent in it then, somewhere, but at least she was calm.

"Silver's ninety-seven-point-six percent human. Two percent's avian, and he's zero-point-four percent canine. But not like Erasers!" Angel added hastily at Max's expression. "Almost all of it's dormant. The leftover little bit lets him have the senses and abilities of a dog, like Shadow's a cat."

Silver smiled at Max then shoved his beanie into the backpack he was shouldering. His white hair was pretty startling. "My hair's a result of the dog genes being made dormant. They were meant to decide my melanin levels."

Nudge sounded a little disappointed. "No cool superpowers?"

Shadow laughed. "Do the honours, Angel."

"Shadow can control fire and air, and Silver can control rocks and water." Angel sounded almost reverent.

Silver corrected her. "Technically, we _manipulate_ chemical reactions and gases, and minerals and liquids."

Nudge squealed. "So you CAN firebend! That is so awesome! Oh my gosh, I was right! Maybe I'm developing future-seeing powers or something! Wouldn't that be cool?"

Dylan seemed intrigued. "How? Those are almost the very forces of nature."

"They implanted special... chemicals, let's call them, which activate and enhance the supernatural ability in all minds by about 400% when we were still foetuses. The implants were designed to let us manipulate specific particles." Shadow had never had to explain that to anyone before. It felt oddly refreshing to be the one with the upper hand.

Max was staring Shadow and Silver down.

"They're good, Max, they can be really powerful allies!" Angel said earnestly.

"All I see are dangerous enemies."

"Then don't be our enemies." Silver said. He seemed to have latched onto an idea. "We don't have anywhere better to go, anything better to do. Let us help you with your mission."

"Don't tell me you know about taking down Itex too."

Shadow rolled her eyes. "We were set to hunt you and your flock once. But then we got overloaded with other jobs, and they decided to postpone it." Silver looked at Max.

"Lucky too. You seem like good people."

It was Max's turn to roll her eyes.

"You wouldn't have been able to catch us anyway, you know. You weren't the first to be set the task." Fang sounded bored.

Shadow smiled a blood-chilling smile. "Don't be so sure. We have a perfect track record."

"Never failed a single job," mumbled Silver, suddenly interested in his fingernails.

Angel sighed. "Not helping with the not-dangerous argument."

Max looked on the edge. She eventually went for a walk and took Fang, saying something about thinking about it. She didn't seem worried about leaving the flock with the assassins, somewhat trusting in Angel's report.

* * *

><p>Shadow was chatting with Iggy while Silver discussed flying techniques with Dylan. Angel and Gazzy were listening to Dylan and Silver. Nudge was just joining Shadow and Iggy when Max and Fang reappeared.<p>

"Ok. We've heard from a very reliable source, and we've decided you can join us. As long as someone watches you at all times."

Silver raised an eyebrow. "What kind of reliable source lives in the middle of the Mesa National Forest? Mister Suspicious Mushroom?" Iggy high-fived the white-haired birdkid's hand with creepy precision for someone who couldn't see it coming.

Shadow rolled her eyes and slapped Silver upside the head. "'The Voice'?" she asked in a bored tone. Max huffed in annoyance, obviously irritated by how much Shadow knew about her and her flock. "Yes, the Voice told me that you had 'good intentions' and you 'could be trusted'." She obviously wasn't too convinced, but the Voice had never been wrong before.

"Yay, you can stay!" Nudge tackled Shadow. "Finally, a girl my own age! Oh my gosh, we can do so much fun stuff together! We can go shopping, and organise picnics and-"

Shadow laughed and hugged Nudge back. "Yeah, I guess we can." She looked over at Silver in a way only he could understand. _I hope we're making the right decision here._

Dylan and Silver asked Max's permission before going out to try some of the flying techniques that Silver wanted to teach Dylan. Fang sat and asked more about Shadow on Max's request, while she tagged along Silver and Dylan's flying trip out of interest. She left Fang in charge.

Fang found out a few more little facts about Silver and Shadow. They had been trained in their job by the best in Russia. Derek and Natalya were the names of their old trainers. But they had never been allowed to call them that- always Falcon and Raven. Shadow's training had been more focused on the _il_legal arts, and Silver on the _slightly,_ slightly more legal ways. But obviously, they were not used for doing anything remotely lawful anyway.

Shadow already knew quite a bit about the Flock, down to the details of their teeth structure, but she didn't actually _know_ them. Like she didn't know that Nudge loved to talk so much, and that Max was so overprotective, and that Fang himself often didn't say more than he had to. It was really different, to get to actually _know_ new people for the first time in... well, since she met her trainers. Which was when she was three months and two weeks old.

By the time Shadow and Fang started talking about Silver and Max, said birdkids had landed in the tree they were sitting under. Well, Silver landed in a well-trained perch, the branch swinging a little, executed perfectly at a full-speed flight. Max and Dylan, not so much. The word for their arrival would have been _crash-landing._

Shadow shielded her eyes from the sun with a hand and looked up at Silver. "You tried to teach them the 'Car-brake landing'? What were you thinking! It took us an entire week to master that!"

"Yeah, well we were five years old! I thought they might have picked it up faster!"

Shadow slapped her hand to her face in exasperation. "Dylan's been flying for less than two years! You could have killed him!"

Said mutant fell out of the tree at that moment. He face-planted into the grass of the clearing. Shadow winced. "Ow."

Dylan looked up. "I survived Max pushing me off a three story building. I'll be fine." He dusted himself up and got onto his feet, only to be landed on by none other than Max.

"Is that your elbow that's sunk into my ribs?" Max got off Dylan hastily. Shadow pulled him back up and told him to take off his hoodie. Poking at his back, he called for Silver to get down from the tree. He landed on his hands and flipped himself onto his feet. Max muttered something that sounded like 'show-off'.

"Silver's better with the medical stuff than I am."

"Lemme have a look at the bruise, Dyl." He cringed. "Max, exactly how much do you weigh? You've cracked at least three ribs here."

"I'll be fine in a couple of hours." Dylan was embarrassed at the attention. It wasn't like he was majorly injured.

"Probably less than you, Silver." Max replied huffily.

"I disagree." Shadow chimed in, amused. "Silver's tall, but he's maintained a three percent excess fat body composition since he was ten." Max blinked. "With our job, we kinda had to keep in shape. Really good shape. And throw the birdkid factor in." She explained.

Meanwhile, Silver was busy using one of Dylan's spare shirts to tie a complicated looking brace around the injured area. "We need to make sure they fuse back right. And with wings in the way, that could be a problem. So what I've basically done is pushed your ribcage together slightly, just enough so that we don't get any funnily shaped fusions." He tightened the final knot and chucked Dylan his hoodie. "A shirt will just be difficult."

Dylan nodded. Throwing on his hoodie, he went to put away the t-shirt he was wearing before in his backpack.

Fang strode over. "What happened?"

"Max annihilated Dylan and crushed his poor innocent soul." Silver replied automatically. Shadow elbowed him and explained to Fang. He nodded. "I'll make sure someone's watching him on the way home."

Max tilted her head. "Huh. I guess we should be getting home to mom. There's no threat. But where'll Shadow and Silver sleep?" She seemed to have adjusted to the idea that they had joined her flock.

"I bags the floor!"

"No way, Shad! I'm on the floor!"

"No one needs to sleep on the floor!" Max said.

"Yes someone does. They sleep on the floor so if there's an ambush, they can escape discreetly and come back with a weapon or reinforcements." Shadow said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Max blinked.

"Anyway, your mother's house isn't big enough to include us in a room. I presume you're all paired up already, with the three girls taking the biggest bedroom?" Silver asked.

Fang and Max stared. "You really need to stop doing that."

"Doing what, Max?" Shadow sounded genuinely oblivious.

"Using that information you got from Itex and creeping me out with how much you know." Max visibly shivered. "But yes, you're right. But we can move around a bit. Angel, Gazzy and Dylan can move into one room, Fang, Iggy and I can move into the bigger bedroom then you guys and Nudge can share a room."

"Your two smaller bedrooms aren't big enough for three people at a time. You'd suffocate. If you don't trust us on the couch, we'll camp in the hallway." Silver reasoned.

"Sounds like a plan," agreed Shadow.

"And it would put such less stress on your mother, Max," said Silver, in a 'caring' tone that he used to persuade people to see things his way.

"Are-Are you sure? You'll both be sleeping on the floor," was Max's reply.

"Absolutely," Shadow and Silver chorused.


	4. Really, Max? Really?

Dr Martinez somehow wasn't too stressed about the two new additions to Max's flock. She was just happy that Max was at home again. Safe. Not fighting mutant monsters, not running away from Itex. Safe.

As for the additions themselves, they found ways to become useful. Silver had immediately offered to do grocery runs and calculate money records for Dr M, and Shadow had told Max's mom that she could help with all things electronical. If they were any normal thirteen year olds, then she would have declined. But Angel had explained, to some extent, their training and expertise.

Both Shadow and Silver were eager to begin their services straight away. They explained that they both liked the idea of 'paying before using', and they considered that there was a need to repay Dr M's kindness, if only for the sakes of their consciences.

"Oh, well Shadow, we've been having some issues with the heating in here. There are tools in the garage. And Silver, we need some extra things from the shops. I'll write it down for you."

Shadow was already gone. "Oh, you can just tell me. I have quite a good memory" said Silver.

Dr Martinez nodded grinning. She was always interested in testing just how good birdkids were. "Alright. We need three two litre cartons of extra-rich milk, five loaves of wholemeal bread, two tubes of regular toothpaste, two toothbrushes, two white towel packs from the local bathroom supplier colour coded grey and brown, one kilogram of pacific rose apples, one kilogram of carrots and three boxes of wholegrain cereal, one of them called 'Nutty Nutty: Blue fruit'. Here's two hundred dollars. Just go into the main street and you should do fine." She smiled at him.

Silver nodded and left.

Max and Fang stared as Silver disappeared through the door.

"You trust a newcomer with that money?"

"There's nowhere within an hour's flight he can spend it in besides small-town shops."

"Do you reckon he can actually remember it all?"

A light unscrewed itself and lowered itself a little from the ceiling. Shadow's head popped out. She grinned at the raised eyebrows. "Sure he can. He probably would've been able to even if you gave him a five-minute-long list."

"Shadow, why are you in the ceiling if you're fixing heating?" Dr M looked up at the now-dusty girl.

"I'm following piping. By the way, there's a lot of outdated wiring up here. Could probably burst into flames at any given time. I'll make sure to tell Silver to get some better stuff tomorrow. Don't worry, I know a way to cut the price in half." Shadow re-fitted the light, which now was angled so that one wouldn't be blinded by it upon entering the room anymore.

"She's cheery." Fang commented.

"They say people are always happiest doing what they love," said Dr Martinez.

Max looked sceptical. "I think she touched an exposed wire."

* * *

><p>Shadow hung from the opening in the ceiling for a moment before throwing herself into a flip and landing rolling, straightening next to where Dr M was reading the newspaper, on the dining table. "I found the problem with the heating, but I'll need some parts. It's cause there are several small energy leaks in the circuit. That adds up to a lot of wasted power." Max's mom nodded. "Alright. Better to fix it now than to need and not have later."<p>

"I think you might want to consider rewiring the house, Ms Martinez. There are a lot of problems. I'm surprised the system withstood seven birdkids living here."

There was a sigh. "That's what our last electrician said to do, but he would've charged us three grand. We don't have three grand to spare." Shadow looked around the house thoughtfully.

"I can do it only costing you eight-hundred dollars. No service tax included." Shadow beamed.

"You can really? Oh that'd be wonderful. But how would you cut the cost by that much?"

"I just need to go pick up something. Won't be a moment."

As Shadow fled out the door, Fang followed her.

* * *

><p>As Shadow touched down in the forest, she tried to remember what had happened just before they had seen the hunter.<p>

_We had found a cave on the side of a waterfall. Stashed our gear packs there. "We can't carry them around forever. We'll come back for them." Silver had said._

Waterfall and a cave. _Look for a waterfall with a cave_.

A rustle in the bushes caught Shadow's attention. There was a distinctly humanoid shape in the shadows. She narrowed her eyes and didn't hesitate to pounce.

After muffled yells and multiple struggles, Shadow realised it was Fang.

"What the hell!" Shadow was more than irritated.

Fang brushed off some leaves. "Had to watch you. You didn't say where you were going."

"And you don't feel this need to watch Silver?" Shadow immediately mentally slapped herself. "Dylan. Of course. Haven't seen him the entire afternoon."

Fang looked at Shadow carefully. "Just what are you doing here?"

Shadow sighed. "You didn't seriously think that the world's deadliest assassins would be unarmed, would you? You didn't think that we left Itex without bagging ourselves some goodies that we've become fond of?" She smirked.

Fang blinked as realisation settled in. "I had assumed that you used your supernatural powers and that was it. But clearly I'm wrong."

"Clearly. Hm. Maybe it was a good thing you tagged along. You can help me carry Silver's bag."

A couple of minutes later and Fang and Shadow were hauling massive, over-sized backpacks out of a crack in a waterfall face. "Don't worry. They're waterproof _and_ designed to be worn with the pack on the front. For birdkids and all."

Fang struggled slightly with the overly-heavy pack. "How did you... do what you do with these lumbering things?"

"Oh we didn't carry these for jobs," Shadow laughed as they took off. "These were what we stored things in. We had requested this more... portable method of storage in preparation for our escape. When we went on jobs, we kept our equipment on belts."

"Oh- wow, these are heavy." Fang was fluctuating in height as he struggled with the pack.

"Do you want me to help?"

"No- ah- Yes please." Fang was teetering to one side. Shadow flew under him and gently nudged him upward, balancing him out, before going to fly in front of him so he could use her downdraft.

When they landed on Dr M's back porch, Fang fell over and shoved the enormous backpack towards Shadow. He seemed content with lying on the wooden decking for a while.

Silver had already returned and was lying on the couch. He had gotten every item on the list right, down to the 'Nutty Nutty: Blue fruit' cereal. Shadow asked where she could put their belongings, and Dr Martinez told her that the hallway closet was fine, looking a little perplexed but didn't ask any questions. It suited Shadow too, because they would be sleeping in the hallway anyway.

"Sil, I picked up our stuff from the forest." Silver walked over to her and helped her with his own pack. "You make it sound like 'our stuff' is some sort of narcotic weed or something." Silver smirked.

Max walked out into the hallway. "Okay, where did the packs come from?" She eyed Shadow again.

"We uh, lifted from stuff from Itex before we left. Reckoned that now was as a good time as ever to retrieve them from the forest. Where we hid them." Shadow added.

"And you thought that it's safe to bring them to the place we're living in? Don't you think that there would be trackers planted on that equipment? Bugs? Explosives?" Max looked furious.

Shadow rolled her eyes in exasperation. "First of all, there are no such thing as _trackers_. Only things that _can be tracked_. Electronics can be altered to be able to be tracked by certain satellites, but we had taken the liberty of disabling that function in all of our equipment twenty four hours before we escaped. Second, there are no bugs on our equipment. Nothing that would link us to Itex if we failed. And third, explosives? Really, Max, really? Considering our line of work, you'd think even suggesting putting such volatile materials in our equipment would be imbecilic."

Max sighed and gave way, but didn't look happy about it. As they stashed their gear in the closet, Shadow opened one section of her pack, where she stored all of the clothes she had acquired for multiple covers over the years. Considering she had worked for Itex for over three years now, her closet was measly. But eventually she found a modern black shirt and white singlet from a 'teen-partygoer' cover, and some jeans from a 'street gang' cover.

The clothes Shadow was currently in were covered in dust and filth. She asked Max's mom where the bathroom was, out of courtesy even though she already knew, and then promptly went to shower with the set of clothes she had just grabbed.

To her dismay, the jeans she had picked had multiple rips in them as part of the particular cover they had played, and the top she had chosen didn't cover her neck, shoulders or right forearm at all.

Even less convenient was that it was far too tight to hide her wings in, so she had to leave them outside her outfit. The cover must have been for a costume party of something, or the top would never have been that inconvenient for her wings. In general, there was too much skin showing for Shadow's taste or peace of mind. She decided to just find a hoodie to throw on and deal with it.

She threw her clothes in the washing machine on her way to Silver.

"Lend me your hoodie? You have a jacket anyway."

Only when Shadow had the oversized blue hoodie on did she stop feeling exposed. She then went to find Max. There were some things that needed talking about.

She knocked on the door of the largest bedroom, which she presumed Maximum would have been sharing with the younger girls. She was right. "Come in."

Max had was sitting at a desk, reading something on a computer. She swivelled round to face Shadow. "Yes, Shadow?"

"Seeing that Silver and I seemed to have joined your flock, there are some things we need to talk about. I want to know how you can maximise the use of our skills, and how things are run. Naturally, as the leader, I thought it would be best to talk to you about this."

Max nodded. "So you already know about our game plan to take down Itex. Well, it's not really a plan, more a purpose." Max frowned. "Anyway. What do you need to know."

"I've been briefed on your skills, but I don't think the report given to us was entirely accurate, or in any way recent. Tell me what you can do." Shadow said simply.

Max was a tad reluctant, but figured that Shadow was part of the flock now, and she would have to know sooner or later. There was just something about the thirteen-year-old that unnerved her. "Ok. We'll start with Angel..."

Pretty soon Shadow and Max had exchanged enough information for them to fully understand each other's positions. Max found out just about everything about Shadow and Silver, from their tactical advantages to their unusual eating and sleeping patterns. She made a mental note to herself to warn her mom. The duo had some interesting habits.

At the dinner table, Max had some news.

"Okay, Shadow and I had a talk today, and tomorrow we're going out into the forest to see exactly what she and Silver can do. Oh, and we need to let them see what we can do too. So it's fair." The flock nodded. Silver spoke up.

"I suggest we hold this thing far, far away from Ms Martinez's house, by the way. We're as stealthy as ninjas, but we can be pretty destructive when need be."

Shadow nodded. "Wait. Ninjas? Really Sil? Ninjas?"

"Fine, fine. 'Teenage mutant ninja birdkids'." He made quotation marks in the air with his fingers.

"I bags Raphael!"

The flock erupted into a chorus of giggles and laughter. "They're so funny, Iggy! Aren't they? Maybe they were trained in being funny too! Oh my gosh, that would be SO weird though, it's like-" Iggy was too busy laughing to notice Nudge babbling beside him.

Max looked around at her flock. They seemed to like the new additions to their family. _**But what if this is all an act? What if-**_ Max was cut off by the Voice.

_**They are of pure heart, Maximum. They are happy to finally belong in a family.**_

_**So can we trust them?**_

_**You can never trust trained assassins. But you **_**can**_** trust these two hybrids on the run.**_

_**What the heck does that mean?**_

As usual, the Voice left Max with more questions than answers. Fang noticed her brief space-out and touched her hand. She looked at him, and he had a questioning expression. _**I'll tell you later**_.

Meanwhile, Dr M watched curiously as Shadow and Silver ate. They didn't seem to eat as eagerly as the rest of the flock. Shadow ate in small, frequent bites. Silver took his time, taking big forkfuls ever so often. She looked over at Iggy, who was inhaling the food that he had prepared himself earlier, and even polite Dylan, who was trying to stay as neat as possible while eating at a hundred-mile-per-hour pace.

What was even more curious was that Shadow stopped after her second helping, claiming she was full. Birdkids were _never_ full. "Well, help yourself to the leftovers later if you get hungry," said Dr M. 'If there ARE any leftovers,' she thought.

There had been enough food prepared to feed a small army, and after dinner there was only two plates of food left. After dinner, Max went to tell her mom about Shadow and Silver's habits.

"No wonder. was just thinking how weird it was that Shadow was full after just the second helping." Max nodded.

"She said that she'd probably have another small meal around midnight. Oh, and Silver only eats two meals a day."

"Well considering how much he ate, even for an Avian American, I wouldn't be too surprised."

"One more thing, mom."

"Mhm?"

"If you here any sounds in the middle of the night, it's probably Shadow on the roof."

Dr Martinez blinked. "Um. Alright then."

* * *

><p>Iggy walked out into the hallway, only to trip over something soft and fabric-like. "Ow. What is that?"<p>

Silver emerged from the bathroom, in a baggy t-shirt and shorts."Oh, sorry. We're sleeping in the hallway, remember? Those are our sleeping bags."Iggy nodded. He carefully manoeuvred around them, and went to the bathroom.

Shadow walked out of the girls' bedroom, after using their en suite. It had taken her an age, but she found a long-sleeved t-shirt and shorts to sleep in. She chucked Silver's hoodie and clothes into the hallway closet. Ms Martinez had cleared it out, stuffing things into the garage closet, for them to use as a wardrobe and storage area.

Iggy walked back to his own room, carefully avoiding Shadow and Silver's sleeping bags.

Shadow and Silver settled in for the night. Silver reached up with a foot and switched off the hallway lights.

Shadow grabbed Silver's hand.

**does this feel as weird to you as it does to me**

**its just like a job only we re not trying to kill anyone**

**and we re not under any command**

**and we re not acting**

Shadow thought for a moment.

**i guess this is what living feels like**

**and i like it no jobs no itex no electrocutions**

Shadow looked over at Silver. She could see in the darkness perfectly, her vision more developed than even an Avian American's, and he knew it. His night vision was a little more average for a birdkid, but he was still able to see his partner clearly. They shared a quick goodnight before going to sleep, turning back to back, leaning on each other like they had been doing ever since they had first shared a sleeping space.

* * *

><p>Max stirred in her sleep. She woke up at a small creak. Closing her eyes, she mumbled.<p>

"Keep it down, Shadow."

A quiet "Sorry" could be heard from the roof.

Up above the house, perched on top of the chimney, was Shadow. She had just finished her midnight meal of leftovers, and couldn't resist going up onto the roof. Still in the clothes she slept in, she wrapped her wings around herself and looked out onto the night.

All there was to see was treetops and nearby rock formations, but it was better than barbed wire and guard huts like she was restricted to in the Itex headquarters in Germany.

Ever since she was old enough to walk, she had always had the urge to go up somewhere high at night and just...watch her surroundings. It was probably something in her cat genes that made high places give Shadow a sense of security. Maybe that had been part of the reason that her genetic makeup hadn't had to be manipulated like Silver's to let her be a birdkid.

Sitting contentedly on Dr M's chimney top, Shadow thought about the events that day. What had really happened? How did they suddenly join a flock?

Shadow wasn't complaining, but was fascinated by the turn of events. In a few short days, Shadow and Silver had turned from the hunters to the hunted. Not that that Itex would succeed in capturing them, of course. They had been their ultimate weapon, their prized crown jewels when Maximum Ride escaped. They were trained to be virtually unstoppable.

Originally they had been planned as back-ups, Shadow and Silver, eventually to become part of a smaller flock, but as Maximum grew up successfully, Itex wanted to do even more, push the limits of nature and see what they could get away with.

Shadow had only been three when her trainers had explained that she and Silver were like over-used test dummies, and that she was lucky that their experimentation had been successful. Itex had desperately needed to have the two experiments obedient and useful once they realised the success, to harness their power. And so that's where Derek and Natalya came in.

The year that Maximum and her flock had escaped, Shadow and Silver had been pushed harder than ever. They doubled their training speed, the trainers doubled their strictness. They were no longer just going to be experiments to use for anything – they were going to become the most dangerous duo alive. Their lives had been decided at the age of four.

Shadow smirked and stretched out her wings lazily. She had been so well informed, those who informed her thinking that her life _was_, in fact, planned out for her already. The dark haired girl laughed. They had really thought that they could keep the world's deadliest assassins on that short a leash.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: These few chapters have been just kinda intro. So sorry if they suck. The real adventure starts soon, I promise.**

**And to B.! Thanks for the review. The only review. To everyone else that's reading this, what are you still doing here? Review please! ^^**


	5. Itex has upgraded

The next morning, while Silver was brushing his teeth, Shadow was still asleep, buried in her sleeping bag. Iggy opened the door to the bedroom he shared with Gazzy, and headed towards the bathroom, barely remembering to avoid where Silver had told him was covered by sleeping bag.

Unfortunately for Iggy, Shadow had shifted in her sleep. Alot. So much that she was right pressed up to the door of said birdkid's room. Iggy tripped over her and face-planted onto the wall, then the floor, leg still caught in Shadow' sleeping bag. Shadow leapt up, suddenly awake, and instinctively pinned the person to the floor by their neck and hips. Which was quite pointless, considering Iggy was already on the floor.

Max emerged from the door furthest down the hall, woken by the thumps. Fang and Dylan groggily opened their door and stared at the scenario in the middle of the hallway. Dr Martinez hadn't even stirred.

"Hey what the- get off me!"

Shadow looked annoyed, and let Iggy up. "**Don't** startle me like that."

"You were sleeping right outside my door! How would I know?"

"Well I guess this is partly my fault. But just as a warning to all of you." She glared around at the older birdkids. "If we had been **any**where else, **any** person that woke me like that would be **fully** incapacitated right now. Fully as in they wouldn't wake up for twenty four hours, and would probably be in a _world_ of hurt when they finally did. " She sounded extremely irritated.

Fang and Dylan nodded and went back to sleep. Silver was smiling to himself, and Max just raised an eyebrow. "Now if you'll excuse me, it's way too early to even be out of REM mode. Wake me in another few hours." And with that, Shadow curled back up in her sleeping bag. Iggy, although a little peeved, carried on to the bathroom without another word.

Max had an expression between shock and amusement. "I've heard her annoyed, but never pissed off before" Max commented finally when Shadow seemed deep asleep again.

"She really doesn't like being woken that early. Especially like that, with Iggy tripping onto her and all. It's hardwired into our brains that being woken roughly means trouble. We _are_ our most vulnerable when sleeping." Max nodded.

"Understand. Poor Iggy. You have very good reflexes."

"Oh that's just Shadow. She's always been a bit high strung, with the feline DNA. I'm trained to be quick, but I'm not _that_ quick. My priorities are really in strength and muscular speed." Silver said. He was already showered and dressed.

_**Shadow had said that he's a morning person. He must have woken up at what, five? Four?**_

Max returned to her room, where Nudge and Angel were still asleep. She figured that if she was up, she might as well shower and change.

Meanwhile, in Fang and Dylan's room, the boys were sprawled on their beds, fast asleep.

In Iggy and Gazzy's room, they had both woken and were talking about the 'Talent show' as they had nicknamed it, later that day. Iggy was preparing a bomb to show off, just for the occasion.

* * *

><p>At the breakfast table, the flock babbled about their power-showing event in a few hours. Nudge wanted to bring the cutlery set to show her magnetic skills. Max told her to ask for some scrap metal from Iggy instead.<p>

Silver sat down, escorting a freshly-awoken Shadow. She had changed into a plain singlet with a windbreaker thrown over and longer shorts. Everyone was dressed for the increasingly warm weather that day, even Fang, in a loose t-shirt and thin exercise pants. Silver hadn't been lying when he said that he got cold easily the day before, but was in a thin, light blue button up shirt and khaki shorts.

Iggy had rolled up his sleeves in the kitchen, making pancakes and toast. He had Dylan helping him, grabbing ice from the freezer for juice and such. After a few more minutes they were done, and Dylan brought the plates of food to the table.

"Dig in!" Iggy grinned as he sat himself at the table. The flock didn't hesitate. They all piled their plates with pancakes and drenched them in syrup. Shadow took a small stack of pancakes and a couple pieces of toast. Silver seemed to be having a competition with Iggy, to see how many pancakes they could stuff into their mouths at once.

Dr Martinez, sitting next to Shadow, chatted quietly with her. The dark haired girl was so young. If one put her in the middle of a regular American high school, she wouldn't even be noticed. It was so hard for Dr M to believe that the courteous teen girl sitting next to her was one of the most dangerous people to have ever lived.

But if one looked closely, they would be able to tell that Shadow had a slim, muscular figure, not soft and skinny like most thirteen year old girls. Shadow had fading scars all over her limbs, most so faded that you had to look up close to tell. And there was something about her eyes.

Those green eyes that looked like stone. Even when happy and cheerful, they didn't look like a kid's eyes. They looked like Max's eyes, Dr M realised. There was a same kind of grief, but a same sort confidence as well. The look of Shadow's stone-like eyes reminded Dr Martinez a little of when she had first met Max, two years ago.

The flock had finished their breakfast in record time. Shadow offered to do the dishes, and Silver followed suit. As the newest flock members rinsed syrup and jam and all sorts of stuff off the plates, the rest of the flock went to prepare for the day.

All except Max and Fang. They stayed at the dining table, half discussing locations for the day's events over a map and half keeping an eye on Shadow and Silver.

"Ok, so I'm guessing we'll have to go past the mountain... We don't want to be seen."

"No, if we go into that valley, we'll just echo. And be heard. And in some ways, that's worse."

"Okay then, what about over here, by the stream... We can use the water to put out any fires that Iggy makes..."

Soon the nine birdkids were making their way to a spot that Max and Fang had chosen, that had a cliff on one side and a stream on the other. Perched on the edge of the cliff, they talked about the order they would go in.

"Okay, so we'll have Iggy and go first with his SMALL, I repeat, SMALL bomb, and then Shadow can use the fire from that to show us some of her skills. Silver follows, then Nudge with her scrap metal, Gazzy can show us his voice imitations and **voice imitations **only, Fang'll do his eerie-ninja-blendy-thingy-" Here Fang raised an eyebrow and looked at Max as if to say 'Really Max? Really?' "-Angel will show us her many multiple powers that she repeatedly creeps us out with, then I'll show Shadow and Silver my hyper-drive. 'Kay?" The flock chorused in agreement.

Iggy flew up onto the top of the rock formation and started to unpack his small-ish bomb, which he had nicknamed the "Mini-Gazzy" because of its horrible smell. As he set up, Max talked to Shadow about just how she controlled fire.

"Well, I don't really control it. As I said, I only control chemical reactions, and while burning is one, fire itself is more of a result of it." Max nodded. "For example, I can make it go a certain direction by stopping the reactions on one side and creating more fuel in the air on another."

"So the air and fire thing go together?" Shadow nodded.

" Yeah. It lets me do cool stuff like collecting fire in my hand by creating a cushion of layers of flammable and non-flammable gas. Not to say that my power over gases is purely for that purpose. Gas molecules are naturally active, and I can push them to do things at my will."

"Like what?"

"I think the coolest thing so far is that I can make winds just by heating and cooling air molecules in masses. It takes quite a bit more energy than playing with fire because you're actually manipulating the stuff itself, whereas with fire all you're really doing is making it do stuff by...well, doing stuff to other stuff." Shadow explained.

Max raised an eyebrow at the range of her vocabulary, alternating between science-geek and kindergarten teacher like the weather in New Zealand went from hot to cold. Angel laughed. "She's trying to dumb it down, Max"

"She let you read her mind again?" Angel rolled her eyes.

"Even _I_ can tell _without _'creepy powers'" Angel made quotation marks in the air with her fingers.

"It is ready!" Said Iggy with a flourish. The flock, at the bottom of the rock formation, waited patiently for him to get on with it. Landing none-too gracefully next to Max, Iggy made a big deal out of pressing the button, twirling his finger in the air for a couple of seconds before finally pushing the remote control.

A fiery inferno unleashed on the top of the rocks with a roar, blooming into a cloud of dust and debris. As the smoke cleared, a smaller fire kept burning on the remains of the bomb and some weeds that had been near it. Gazzy had been rapidly describing the whole thing to Iggy, who looked proud of himself.

Shadow calmly scaled the rocks, and began to manipulate the fire, keeping it going in midair to keep it from spreading. "So as Silver said yesterday, I control chemical reactions and gases. The two combined lets me do pretty cool stuff with things like fire and electricity." Shadow had begun to play with the flames, making them travel in a snake-like formation and loop around in a figure of eight. She then changed the fire from red to purple to green and then back again.

Collecting the fire into three smaller ball-like parts, Shadow started juggling them. The flock watched on in a curious manner as she played with fire as if it were a ribbon, or a ball, or a ring. It was like watching a gymnast showing off with her favourite equipment.

Shadow ended her act in multi-coloured flames, diving for the stream. They hissed as they hit the water, extinguished. There was quiet clapping as Shadow landed on the ground, sitting down against a tree trunk, looking mildly weary. Silver took his act by the stream, beckoning for the flock to follow.

Silver bent down to the stream and scooped up some water in his hand. He stood up. Holding it out in front of him, he moved his hand downwards, and the blob of water stayed suspended in the air. Silver's face had a look of intense concentration. _He'll be so worn out afterward,_ Shadow thought. It was harder to play around with water than fire, because with water you couldn't just lead it when it was in the air, you had to actually move every single molecule through telekinesis.

Silver ran the water through his hair, which immediately became a shade of grey at being wet. He drew the water back out, hair dry instantly. Silver played around with the water a bit, making it pass through Max's fingers without actually making them wet. She looked at her hand curiously.

Silver split the blob into a dozen little droplets, and he flicked them upward into the air with his fingers, making them evaporate at an impossible speed in little puffs. He moved on to his next performance. Closing his eyes, he spoke to the flock. "I suggest you take a step back." They obeyed, Dylan shielding the younger flock members.

After a moment of silence, an enormous geyser shot upwards from the other bank. Shadow face-palmed. _Playing with the currents! The last time he did that his immune system was shot so badly we couldn't work for a week! _Reaching up past the trees, the water stayed suspended in the air, looking like a wobbling mass of clear jelly. He let the water drift around a little before releasing it all over a tree.

The force of the water stripped the tree of all leaves and quite a few weaker twigs as well. The water immediately soaked into the ground, leaving no trace that it was ever there, besides the naked tree in the middle of summer. The hole in the ground that the geyser had made was then a kind of spring, water pooling in it from underground.

After a pause, the flock clapped. Silver opened his eyes, looking exhausted, and walked over to Shadow. Falling down next to her, he leaned heavily on his partner, eventually falling onto her lap. He wasn't sweating or anything, but he just about fell asleep in Shadow's lap. "You are such a dumbass sometimes. You could have just made a smaller geyser!" Shadow swept his hair from his eyes. He looked up at her with a 'Now-where's-the-fun-in-that' expression that she knew all too well from past experiences of him showing off during jobs.

Max went to sit down next to them as Nudge demonstrated her metal-attracting skills. "That was quite impressive." Max knew it was much more than that, but didn't feel like expressing it to the already-confident birdkids. "It wears you guys out, I'm guessing?" Shadow nodded.

"Not physically, but it takes a lot of strain on your brain. I remember when we were little, and we'd be pushed to use our powers until we passed out." Max nodded.

"I know what it feels like. To be used like that."

"The thing was they were actually training our _brains_ to handle the stress. Almost doing us a favour." There was a wondering tone to her voice, as if she couldn't believe that they could have done anything remotely nice.

Shadow remembered the multiple times Falcon had dropped Silver in clear plastic vats of gel to make her use her skills over air. He would taunt her, telling her that she was useless, not even able to save her own 'brother'. The sick trainer knew that that would push her over the edge, the possibility that Silver _was_ in fact her brother. She had never been told for sure, and Silver's dormant melanin genes meant they couldn't compare hair colour or anything.

Falcon knew that the kids didn't need that kind of incentive to obey him, but he enjoyed it. He had enjoyed watching Shadow's pained face, and she knew it.

She remembered looking into the green slime-like substance, seeing Silver struggling, his own powers useless to save himself. She remembered Falcon's smug face when she made the bubble, letting Silver breathe, his scars pulling at his version of a smile. Shadow's fist clenched silently. She hated that man.

"But still, it was pretty unpleasant," Shadow kept her voice nonchalant.

Max looked a little envious. _**They hadn't been through all the horrible tests and experiments that they had. Shadow and Silver had been treated like human beings! It was hardly fair.**_ Max didn't realise that she had muttered aloud.

"What's not fair, Max?"

She hesitated. "Well, the thing is, you've been safe all your lives. No one's been after you to kill you, no one's experimented on you, and it just seems like for some reason you were treated better than us."

Shadow laughed a little and looked at Max strangely. "Maximum, we are world class assassins. There are _always_ people after us, and some of them could rival Itex. Our entire _lives_ have been an experiment! Itex never meant for us to be this important. It was only after _you_ escaped that they decided that we had to be trained so... specifically, anyway." Shadow made out.

Silver looked at Max as well, managing to sit up a little, with an expression that looked almost questioning, as if wondering if Max had been joking. "Max, we don't mean to offend you, but by our records, you escaped from Itex at seven. We have had to deal with Itex for thirteen years, ten of which were spent in a high-security training facility in uninhabitable Russia with unforgiving trainers. Max, our suffering began before we even knew how to say the word. I think that yours and our lives balance out quite equally." His voice as a little drowsy, but convincing and even a little patronising. He believed in what he was saying.

Max recoiled at the information. "I-I never knew. I'm sorry. It's just, I was assuming from how much you had told me- and- I'm sorry." She looked like she was unfamiliar with the words. "Don't have to apologise Max. Easy mistake" Shadow said, with a hint of contempt, as Silver seemed to have truly dozed off in her lap.

Max felt embarrassed for the rest of the time in the woods. She feigned interest in her flock displaying their talents.

Shadow had pushed the little conversation to the back of her mind, watching the flock. Ever so often she would check Silver's temperature. Using their powers and draining so much energy from the brain could sometimes cause malfunctions in the body's automatic systems, including the immune system. It was a rare scenario for an instant high fever, but it was also one of the most dangerous.

Raising an eyebrow occasionally during Angel's performance, Shadow carefully stored the information she was receiving. One noticed fact was that Angel was most prone to power mutations. The other was that Fang, Max and Angel could all breathe underwater.

By the end of the little talent show, it was past noon, and Silver had recovered enough to fly. On their way back to Dr M's house, the flock chatted to Shadow and Silver about what they thought of their performances. Some were disappointed to hear that Silver had slept through them. Others asked the duo about their powers.

All in all, it was a cheery mood. Until they arrived home.

* * *

><p>The house had been trashed.<p>

Max went berserk, screaming for Dr Martinez. The rest of the flock rushed to their rooms to see if anything had been taken.

Silver whistled. "Looks like we really are being hunted."

"Yeah. Good thing we stuffed our packs in the attic before we left." They had left clothes and sleeping bags in the hall closet, but for Dr M's sake, they had put all their high-tech and/or dangerous items in the attic.

Max rushed out of Dr M's room and glared at Shadow and Silver. "You said there aren't any trackers on you!" She was practically screaming.

"There isn't!" Shadow replied angrily. "There must be field agents in this area!"

Max blinked, anger wavering momentarily. "Field agents?"

"They have more that bots and experiments, you know. Itex has upgraded."

Silver took over the situation in a calmer manner. "Look, if they had been after us birdkids, then they probably just sedated your mother somewhere. They have no use for her."

"They could have taken her hostage!"

"Trust me. Hostages haven't worked for Itex very well in the past. They don't take them anymore."

Max heaved a breath and tried to calm down. "So she should still be here?"

"Probably holed up somewhere out of the way." Shadow replied.

"On it." Silver started methodically going through the most common hiding places. "Looks like they didn't get the attic. My hair's still jammed in the ceiling trapdoor." _Good. That means that haven't taken our stuff._

Shadow and Max searched the rest of the house, eventually finding Dr Martinez semi-conscious in the pantry. As they lifted her onto the couch, Shadow called to Silver, and Max checked her for injuries.

"She's fine. Oh thank god." Shadow looked around for needle marks.

"They used a gas sedative. She'll wake up fine."

The flock gathered in the living room. It seemed that none of their stuff had been taken.

"But that still means they know where you live now. They would have seen Iggy's bombs, for example, and feathers strewn on beds." Shadow said.

"And I wouldn't put it past them to have brought fingerprint and DNA testers." Silver added.

Max massaged her temple. "We're really sorry Max. It's probably our fault."

She sighed. "This would have happened eventually anyway. But I don't think that they know you're with us yet. You didn't sleep in rooms."

"If they didn't search the hallway cupboard, that is. I think we've at least doubled the bounty on this flock's heads." Shadow remarked sadly.

Max looked up at the flock and smiled weakly. "Time to be off then." The flock nodded solemnly, and went off to pack and clean their rooms of any traces of birdkid. Shadow and Silver tidied up the worst parts of the wreckage, such as broken plates and whatnot, then went to pack themselves.

Soon enough they all met in the living room again. Dr Martinez had begun to wake up, and seemed to comprehend the situation. She gave Max a hug.

Shadow and Silver entered the room with professional-looking, but this time regular sized, backpacks slung over their shoulders. They had packed their favourite equipment and some clothes. In their arms were their much larger storage packs. "We'll drop these off in the forest on the way. Don't want to incriminate your mom."

After making sure Max's mom was fully conscious and was okay, the flock set off. The assassins hid their massive packs in an abandoned fox's den and hid the entrance. They flew east, quickly leaving the Colorado state borders.


End file.
